rrsnathan wrote:
Quasars, at billions of light-years from Earth the most distant observable objects in the universe, believed to be the cores of galaxies in an early stage of
development.
(A) believed to be
(B) are believed to be
(C) some believe them to be
(D) some believe they are
(E) it is believed that they are
Please explain strategically
Dear
rrsnathan,
I'm happy to help with this.
First of all, a hugely helpful technique on GMAT SC is what is sometime called "eliminating fluff". Here, we have a subject, "
quasars", and then a big honking modifier. Mentally, cross out that modifier, everything between the commas --- then we have
Quasars ...
(A) believed to be
(B) are believed to be
(C) some believe them to be
(D) some believe they are
(E) it is believed that they areWell, we have a subject, and we need a full bonafide verb. "
Believed", by itself, is just a participle, a noun-modifier, not a full verb. (The full verb is "
are believed"). See this blog on participles:
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2012/participle ... -the-gmat/Choice
(A) has a participle, not a full verb, so it creates a sentence that has no verb --- the famous "missing verb" mistake. See:
https://gmat.magoosh.com/lessons/914-the ... rb-mistakeChoice
(B) correctly has a full verb, and it gets the idiom correct as well. For the idiom, see:
https://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idiom ... d-knowing/https://magoosh.com/gmat/2013/gmat-idiom-ebook/Choice
(C),
(D) &
(E) all have a double subject .....
(C) Quasars, some believe them to be ...
(D) Quasars, some believe they are ...
(E) Quasars, it is believed that they are ... These may sound colloquially acceptable, but they are absolutely unacceptable in the formal academic standards of the GMAT SC. See:
https://gmat.magoosh.com/lessons/915-the ... ct-mistakeTherefore, the only possible answer is
(B).
Does all this make sense?
Mike